Law enforcement operations and organizations which support other first responders typically have fixed assets which operate independently from assets of other organizations. Although assets in each organization may generate information vital to successful operations, it is desirable to provide even more information to enhance performance and efficiency or improve public safety. Systems according to the invention not only generate more useful information, but also make that information more broadly available across organizations in an optimal manner with the goal of providing greater utility to responders. Numerous operations would benefit from an ability to generate and share situational information by making that information immediately available to members in different organizations who can use the information to more effectively perform their line or supervisory duties. In many instances, personnel are at risk for encountering unanticipated dangers which have been difficult to monitor. It is desirable to provide improved techniques for more comprehensive monitoring, more timely generation of alerts to first responders and improved command and control in these circumstances.
Many patrol officers spend a large percent of duty time in association with an assigned patrol vehicle. Typically, the patrol vehicle serves as a mobile center for enhanced communication, information acquisition, generation of GPS information and video monitoring. However, when an officer steps out of a patrol vehicle far fewer resources are at hand, and many private security personnel have more limited resources. Some security personnel never have access to a vehicle, and may have little more to communicate with than a service radio or a personal hand-held device.
Educational organizations are typically spread over multiple locations. Even facilities on a single campus may place a large set of school faculty (e.g. teachers, professors, principals, deans, and administrative assistants) across over multiple buildings into which hundreds or thousands of students move throughout a day. Support personnel could be responsible for responding to emergencies (e.g., relating to medical, security and facilities problems). Although some of the organization assets could generate information vital for day to day operations (e.g., location of school faculty for impromptu meetings), having even more useful information is desirable to enhance performance or improve safety in an emergency response. Systems according to the invention not only generate information of great utility for emergency responses, but also make that information broadly and rapidly available for optimal use by members of the operation. Responding personnel would benefit from a system which generates and transmits to them timely situational information and makes the information immediately available to all members of the operation who can potentially use the information to more effectively perform their duties. In many instances, these responding personnel (e.g., public and private security personnel and first responders) are at risk as they encounter unanticipated dangers which cannot be easily monitored. Thus it is desirable to provide improved techniques for more comprehensive monitoring both within and across organizations to timely generate precautionary information (e.g., alerts and situational awareness information).
With increasing violence in schools, educational institutions deserve improved emergency response times. Schools are often soft targets for terrorists, extremists and others to maximize devastation among the innocent. In the United States a series of attacks on school campuses has raised awareness of the need for improved security and responsiveness to protect the lives of students and faculty. The reality is that a large number of casualties can occur quickly and before responding organizations arrive, thereby maximizing psychological damage across an entire community.
It is recognized that there are no simple solutions to prevent these horrific events. Proposals such as placing full time private security or police on site are not cost effective and have not been shown to be complete solutions when implemented. The effectiveness of large scale, protective infrastructure, such as fences has also been questioned. Nor does it seem feasible to place a camera or other similar security devices in every classroom or location of concern. Without fully comprehensive monitoring, there are weak spots in the security solution. Generally, these solutions require expensive investments which have to be both operated and maintained under constraints of limited public funding.
In the past, most security personnel embedded within schools have only had voice communications through private Push to Talk (PTT) radios (also known as LMR: Land Mobile Radios) to communicate emergency information and elicit responses. An associated central dispatch office may have some network based infrastructure security solutions at its disposal, but the direct communications with security personnel in the field has typically been limited to voice communications. This severely constrains the type and volume of information which can be communicated between one responder and a dispatch office and constrains dissemination of optimal information between field personnel. Moreover, in many instances, timely critical communication with those in emergency situations has not been possible. For example, real time communication with school faculty or students requiring urgent medical attention has generally not been possible; and there have been limited means to acquire informative responses from those most in need. Regarding responding organizations other than security or campus police, many individuals in responding organizations do not even have PTT radios and are not equipped to receive information from a network when an urgency arises. Rather, they are usually contacted from a call list, via a landline or a cell phone. As a result they may have such insufficient knowledge about the situation that their arrival and ability to assist can be suboptimal. However, a technology common among many individuals in each of these groups is that the majority of persons are likely to possess smart phones, either privately owned or provided as employer-owned assets.